The Nation - News from Jan. 14, 1988

Two people infected with the AIDS virus testified before the President’s AIDS commission and urged it to get home care and experimental treatments to patients faster. The President’s Commission on the Human Immunodeficiency Virus began three days of hearings in Washington on health care for people who have the AIDS virus. The two who testified, identified only as Kathleen and George, were the first people acknowledging that they have the virus to testify before the commission, set up last June to advise President Reagan on numerous aspects of the AIDS epidemic. Kathleen recommended that a third-party system be set up to anonymously warn the sexual contacts of people who have the virus that they may have been exposed to it. George urged the commissioners to cut the red tape that blocked his infant daughter, who also has AIDS, from getting into experimental treatment.